How should Scarborough Centre change? Let children tell us, says City of Toronto

Thestar.com
June 4, 2021
Mike Adler

Should we ask children what to do with the area around Scarborough Town Centre?

The city wants any suggestions it can get, including from kids, on how to plan for growth in a large area between Hwy. 401 and Ellesmere Road.

Our Scarborough Centre covers landmarks smack in the middle of the former borough -- the mall, Scarborough Civic Centre, and Frank Faubert Wood Lot being a few -- as well as a large employment district and land already sporting condo towers.

The mall, of course, is a stop for the long-awaited Scarborough Subway Extension and the soon-to-be decommissioned Scarborough Rapid Transit line, which could one day be a linear park.

Significant growth is coming, so people’s opinions are needed, Tyler Hughes, a Scarborough community planner for the city, wrote last month.

“Any member of the public that has an interest in city building should see this study as an opportunity to shape Scarborough Centre's future as a vibrant, sustainable, transit-oriented complete community,” Hughes said.

Past visions for the area haven’t exactly worked out.

Scarborough Centre was planned as a regional hub decades ago in ways that favoured the car over bicycles and pedestrians.

Former Scarborough Centre councillor Glenn De Baeremaeker called the area’s road network chaotic and spaces between it “inhospitable to normal human beings.”

Raymond Moriyama, commissioned to build the Civic Centre in 1969, designed it as part of a larger district to make Scarborough Centre the focal point of a modern, democratic city. In 2015, he was disappointed to see his vision abandoned.

Nearby residents supported a plan, Span McCowan, to cover McCowan Road north of Ellesmere -- a trench for traffic hard to cross safely -- and create a park and market building above it. Without funds, Span McCowan faded.

After a Scarborough Centre Secondary Plan in 2005, the city in 2009 added a plan for the Scarborough Civic Centre Precinct, an area around the building that includes green spaces, sculpture gardens and Albert Campbell Square, which set out a prioritized list of beautification projects.

In 2018, Scarborough Centre also got a Public Space and Streetscape Master Plan. a Transportation Master Plan, and Public Art Master Plan Study.

What is now known as Our Scarborough Centre started that year to “develop a revised vision and planning framework” to guide decades of subway-driven growth and, the city says, “to create an exemplar civic vision and signature in Scarborough Centre.”

A final report to Scarborough Community Council and City Council is expected in June 2022.

Scarborough Centre, as envisioned by Ella, a student in a Grade 4/5 class at Epiphany of our Lord School, is shown on a map she illustrated. The City of Toronto is encouraging children, as well as photographers, to participate in guiding future growth for the area around Scarborough Town Centre in a project called Our Scarborough Centre. -- City of Toronto photo

Besides asking community members and property owners in the study area, which stretches from Brimley Road to Bellamy Road North, the city is trying unusual things to find this new vision.

Through 'Little Scarborough', it’s encouraging children to share their ideas on a map, and asking teachers and parents to post illustrated maps on social media with the #LittleSC hashtag.

People are also being asked to show photos of the study area on Twitter and Instagram using the hashtag #ShowUsSC.

More on the study is at www.toronto.ca/OurScarboroughCentre.